Saturday, August 25, 2007

Swatch Chief Wants Green Fuel

ZURICH - The man behind the micro-sized Smart car, the head of Swiss watch group Swatch, wants to develop a fuel cell engine for an affordable "green" vehicle, a company spokeswoman said Friday.The spokeswoman confirmed a report in Swiss magazine Hebdo, which reported Swatch chairman Nicolas G. Hayek as saying: "I want to do everything within my powers to accelerate the development of alternative and renewable energy. In Switzerland, like elsewhere in the world, we are going far too slowly."The spokeswoman said it was a personal project of Hayek's, who is in his late seventies.The engine is aimed at harnessing hydrogen fuel cell technology to produce non-polluting propulsion.The Hayek-backed project intends to begin industrial production and marketing of the new engine to carmakers in 2010, the magazine said.View source.